As part of our efforts to be reflexive about the practice of sociology (see “Next Steps for Sociologica” by the editors in volume 12, number 1, 2018) we are publishing a series in which we invite a number of sociologists to contribute personal essays about a particular aspect of our craft. In the first such symposium we asked a dozen prominent sociologists to reflect on the process of finding a research topic. The contributions to “Heuristics of Discovery” (Sociologica, 2018/1) were extraordinarily diverse. In fact, we were surprised at how very differently these researchers approached the task. Across those differences there was one commonality: each essay was deeply thoughtful and highly insightful. They were also extraordinarily well-received. A good number of readers have written, for example, that they are using the essays in their graduate teaching.
For this symposium we invited ten influential sociologists to write about their publication strategies. Again, as you will see, the contributions are lively and informative. We are confident that they will be valuable to sociologists at every stage of professional development, whether as instructive to younger scholars or helpful to established researchers as an opportunity to reflect on their own strategies (or even deliberate lack of such). Across all these essays — the ones we are publishing in this issue and those in the previous symposium — there is another commonality: almost all of the authors wrote an accompanying note saying how much they enjoyed writing! We hope you enjoy reading them.
Here was our prompt:
For a recent number of Sociologica (2018/1) we asked a dozen prominent sociologists to reflect on the process of finding a research topic. We are writing now to ask you to reflect on your publication strategy. Some guiding questions: First, how do you know when a manuscript is ready to go? An obvious second question is about books versus articles or chapters in edited volumes. But also what about publishing in established outlets versus new journal ventures? Have you edited a volume or special issue of a journal? In general about publication strategy, what advice would you give to a young aspiring sociologist? Our telegraphic questions are merely illustrative. We cast a wide net, expecting high variance not only in your answers but also in the way you frame the question.